The following invention relates to a method and system for providing engineering support services and, in particular to a method and system for remotely diagnosing and resolving a technical problem associated with a product or service.
Customers of technically sophisticated products and services often require technical support to properly use the product or service. For example, to implement Shipley's ultrafill copper electrolyte electroplating process requires specific engineering expertise. Thus, sellers of technical products and services typically make available engineers and technicians to respond to requests for technical support from their customers. For some support requests, the engineer can determine the underlying problem and implement a resolution remotely, for example through a telephone call with the customer. In many cases, however, in order to properly service the customer, the engineer must observe the problem first hand because the customer is not sufficiently skilled in identifying and describing the symptoms of the problem. In such cases, the engineer must either go to the customer's location or, if feasible, have the product in question shipped to the engineer so that the engineer can correctly diagnose and repair the problem. In either case, however, because qualified engineers are costly to train and maintain, the cost of providing competent technical support is high and is often reflected in increased product costs. More typically, the service provider is not able to staff sufficient qualified engineers which results in inefficient and slow customer support, especially if on-site service is required.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a system and method for providing engineering and technical support services to remotely diagnose and resolve a technical problem associated with a technical product or service.